An organisation that has championed the teaching of evolution in America's schools is offering support to teachers who have come under attack for lessons on climate change.

The National Centre for Science Education (NCSE), which has worked for 30 years to keep evolution in the classroom, said it will begin offering teachers advice on how to deal with students, parents, and even school authorities demanding they drop classes on climate change.

"We have been getting anecdotal reports for a couple of years now of teachers getting hammered for teaching climate science – just like they did for teaching evolution," said Eugenie Scott, director of the centre.

The new initiative launches on 16 January – in the throes of a Republican primary contest in which candidates have fallen over each other to discredit climate change, or the link to human activity.

Mann used to work at the University of Virginia. Cuccinelli says he is investigating fraud; university lawyers told the court on Thursday he was mounting an assault on academic freedom.

In the last two years, however, the NCSE has registered a crossover effect, with opponents of evolution also taking on climate science. "Evolution is still the big one, but climate change is catching up," Roberta Johnson, director of the National Earth Science Teachers Association (Nesta), told Science earlier this year.

A number of state legislatures have taken up bills that would limit teachers' ability to discuss topics such as evolution, climate change, and stem cells. Only one state – Louisiana – has actually voted through such changes.

But local school districts are also beginning to look more closely at the teaching of climate change.

The strategy of demanding that teachers "teach the controversy" is similar to that used by opponents of evolution who have demanded equal time for the creationist ideology known as "intelligent design".

American students at the high school level typically learn only the basics about climate change – that the planet is getting warmer, and that human activity has been a cause of that.

But even those basics are apparently too much for those who doubt the existence of climate change, and are opposed to environmental regulations.

In an online survey last year conducted by Nesta, more than 25% of teachers reported disputes with students, parents, or school administrators who doubted the existence of climate change, or that it was caused by human activity.

Some 82% of respondents to a similar online survey last year by the National Science Teachers Association reported encountering climate change scepticism – including 26% who faced such doubt from school administrators. "I do fear for the upcoming generation," said Scott. "If teachers are intimidated and neglect this topic for fear of raising controversy we wil have a new generation that is under-educated and less concerned about an issue than they need to be."